1. Field Of The Invention
The present invention relates to integrated circuit electronics and to sense-amplifier circuits. More particularly, the present invention relates to a self-clocking multi-input sense amplifier.
2. The Prior Art
Numerous sense amplifier circuits are known in the prior art. Typical of such prior-art sense amplifier technology is the sense amplifier disclosed in Blalock et al., "A High Speed Clamped Bi-Line Current-Mode Sense Amplifier", IEEE Jour. of Solid State Circuits, Vol. 26, No. 4, April 1991.
This particular sense amplifier is intended for use in dynamic memories and provides high response speed independent of bit line capacitance. While providing generally satisfactory operation, sense amplifiers such as this suffer from one or more of several problems. First, a special precharge pulse is required. Its duration directly affects total sensing time and variations in precharge time affect output signal timing. In addition, such sense amplifiers provide a relatively low tolerance for the inevitable mismatch of transistor parameters.
It would be advantageous to provide a self-clocked sense amplifier which avoids one or more shortcomings of prior-art sense amplifiers.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a self-clocking sense amplifier.
A further object of the present invention is to provide a self-clocking sense amplifier optimized for signals close to VDD.